"It is just such an effective tool to harass, intimidate, terrorize the population, to keep people on the move," said Karin Wachter with the Bukavu-based office of the International Rescue Committee, a US aid agency. "It is also the issue of impunity. There are no consequences for their actions."
Blaming others
Leaders of the main factions at war here have begun to acknowledge the existence of rape. But although they say they punish wrongdoers, the leaders lay most of the blame at their enemies' feet. Few, if any, face prosecution in a country where basic government functions have all but collapsed.
In a recent interview in Bukavu, the political chief of the Mai-Mai group, Masa Walimba, boasted of two soldiers who had been executed for rape and looting. He said his opponents, a Rwandan group called the Congolese Rally for Democracy, which controls South Kivu, were the worst offenders.
The South Kivu provincial governor, Xavier Cirimwami also cited an incident from the enemy camp: An ethnic Hutu combatant, he said, had snatched a baby from its mother's back, and used it to beat the woman before raping her.
"I know my military is disciplined," Cirimwami said of the forces of his Congolese Rally for Democracy. "There are just a few cases of rape or robbery, and those we punish."
Human-rights groups, along with UN officials, have begun a campaign pressing for greater prosecution, including encouraging women to testify against the accused and lobbying the leaders of the armed factions to take action against the perpetrators. Rape is a war crime, prosecutable under international law.
At the mobile clinic here, the thought of rapists being punished was met with skepticism. Just the other day, a father of two girls, ages 12 and 14, who had been raped, marched into the barracks of the Congolese Rally for Democracy and demanded justice. The local commander took the rare step of throwing the accused in jail, clinic workers said, but who knew for how long. "Maybe in one week they will say he ran away and they will release him," Dr. Etienne Mugula said.
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